I really enjoy the Marketoonist (Tom Fishburne). These cartoons offer funny and insightful commentary on marketing practice. In this cartoon and accompanying commentary (June 18, 2017), Fishburne questions the validity of focus group research. What are some of the points made by the Marketoonist here (scroll down the linked page to see some of his previous cartoons dealing with focus groups)? When are focus groups most useful to marketing managers? Why are some marketing managers using them less often these days?

This article at Bloomberg, “ The Inventor of Customer Satisfaction Surveys Is Sick of Them, Too, ” describes challenges to measuring customer satisfaction using surveys. This article raises questions about “Interpreting the Data” – which is step 4 in our Five-Step Scientific Approach to the Marketing Research Process. Look through that section of chapter 7. Which of the bold key terms in that section relate to the problems discussed in this article? For a business that really wants to assess customer satisfaction, what could be done to minimize the issues raised in the article?

One example of the experimental method discussed in chapter 7 is an A/B test. You can read about a real-life example of this in “ Google Tested 3 Versions of This Honey Maid Ad to See Which Worked Best Online ” (Adweek, April 13, 2016). Google compared :15, :30, and 2:17 versions of an ad for Honey Maid. After reading the article, figure out how the ad follows each stage of the book’s “five-step scientific approach to the marketing research process” (see Exhibit 7-3). Provide answers to these questions: 1) What is the problem? 2) What are some examples of a situation analysis that Google might conduct (go beyond the article)? 3) How do they [Continue Reading …]